What’s Driving Elon Musk?

Elon Musk wields unprecedented political and economic power, leveraging his control over critical infrastructure like SpaceX, Starlink, and X to entrench his influence and bypass traditional regulatory oversight. His massive campaign donations and public alignment with far-right movements signal a departure from traditional corporate lobbying, aiming instead to secure a dominant position in a future defined by superintelligence and humanoid robotics. Quinn Slobodian, a professor of international history and co-author of *Muskism*, argues that Musk’s worldview is rooted in a belief in cognitive hierarchies and a disdain for "woke" empathy, which he views as a systemic vulnerability. By treating social order as a programming problem and utilizing "financial fabulism" to sustain extreme market valuations, Musk attempts to reshape global governance, creating a precarious dependency that challenges the stability of democratic institutions and the future of human agency.